Hyundai Eon Launches in India from £3.5k

The Hyundai Eon has launched in India with plans to take on the market leading small car, the Maruti Suzuki Alto. Priced from £3.5k to £4.8k.

No, reasonable though it would be to assume so, the Hyundai Eon is not a new electric car, but it is Hyundai’s answer to the best-selling small car in India – the Suzuki Alto.

Launched on the back of a 900 Crore investment by Hyundai in development and production for the Eon (a Crore is 10 million Rupees, so that’s about £125 million) the Eon is a big push by Hyundai to make a big dent in the burgeoning Indian market.

The Eon comes with an 814cc 3-pot 55bhp petrol engine – which won’t exactly have Indian buyers flying along at breakneck speeds – and offers properly decent styling, rather than the toy car styling of something like the Tata Nano.

Specifications aren’t incredible by European standards – a big feature on the base model will be that it actually gets a heater – but as buyers move up the range proper toys – like AirCon, electric windows and airbags – make an appearance. And compared to the Nano, the Eon is a spectacular car.

The Eon is carrying a weight of expectations for Hyundai, with plans for the Eon to grab a piece of the market below its already successful i10 and i20 models in the region.

From what we can see of the Eon, it looks likely to move Hyundai up to top spot in India.